


it's too early to say goodbye to this world.

by ansutazu



Category: Ensemble Stars! (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Gen, how did this get to 3k words exactly i'm not sure
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-01
Updated: 2017-09-01
Packaged: 2018-12-22 09:45:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,247
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11964828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ansutazu/pseuds/ansutazu
Summary: “keito, we always talk about what my funeral would be like, but we’ve never talked about yours.” // keichi one-shot.





	it's too early to say goodbye to this world.

**Author's Note:**

> 1v1 me in the denny's parking lot, lola oba-chan. xoxo, your petite merde. <3
> 
> the plot was largely based on heaven by harry which you should listen to!! probably after but anyway uuuuuh keichi i didn't edit bc i'm a Fool rip

This spontaneous yet usual act had become quite the norm for Eichi Tenshouin, who, at the age of ten, had exhausted the prospects of play dinosaurs or ninjas or storytelling with his childhood friend, and have now transitioned into a more serious (yet, as children, they treaded with an air of innocence, an aura of wonder) past time, one they’ve both come to find some form of entertainment and joy in, since it allowed them to be in each other’s company. It was the topic of Eichi’s funeral.

They would spend time meandering around the Tenshouin gardens and talking about every single detail of the impending event (though from the way they would enthusiastically talk about it, one would think it was a party they were talking about and not a _funeral_ ), no matter how meaningless and minuscule it may seem, from the arrangement of the flowers Eichi had given him a list for a long time ago, the frame they would use for his picture (ah, the picture being used itself had been carefully considered as well), the people to invite and to avoid inviting, and to the way they would send him off, gravestone and all, etched with nothing but his name, because death was not uncommon in the Tenshouin household, and his would be among the many other markers that lined their plot of the cemetery.

But during their stroll the blonde stops suddenly in his tracks, hands behind his back as he waits for his green-haired companion, pushing up his glasses as he picks up his pace, to catch up to him. When he does, he turns his blue eyes towards him, an innocent child-like wonder shining in his eyes, and yet something bittersweet mixed in as well, as if he knows that this question may very well throw off the good mood they’d put themselves in.

“Keito, we always talk about what my funeral would be like, but we’ve never talked about yours.”

He pauses — he’s but a child, his oratory skills forming, but not fully developed; only time would allow for that ability to blossom into what it could be, but it was but a bud that no one had any care to nip right off. That, and he wonders if his friend would begin to ramble, as he seems to find those tangents of intellect the utmost important thing to come out of his mouth, his lectures a symptom to an infatuation he had with some ‘god’ he often liked to question (at least, that’s what Eichi remembers telling him, and even then, he’s not quite sure if that’s the whole story).

“It’s because my death isn’t as close as yours.” Keito replies, crossing his arms and staring as-a-matter-of-factly at his childhood friend. “Planning mine would be pretty useless — you’d stick your nose in everything, insisting that you take part in every second of the ceremony, but if you’re gone, then those plans become pointless. Besides, it’s not like I want something elaborate or fancy. I’d settle for a normal one, or whatever my family fashions for me. What’s the meaning of this, Eichi? Are you telling me to die?”

“No way — it’s just an idea. It seems as if when we talk about funerals, it’s always about me — and I’m grateful, I know that we’re doing so because your family’s conducted them for as long as I can remember, and I _will_ die someday. I’m selfish enough to ask for this and that for how you’ll — they’ll — send me off, but…you’re mortal too, you know. At the very least, I thought it’d be nice to have some sort of outline — even if it isn’t me who puts the plan in action, we’d have thought of something for you, too. Think of it as a collaboration between the both of us, that we’d both have a say in what each other’s funerals would be like. It’s the least I can do to express my gratitude, to thank you…for being my friend, Keito.”

Keito sighs, and a hand finds itself resting on Eichi’s head, patting it with a (truly childlike, truly baby-like, yet it seemed as if etched into it was also years of knowledge and reasoning) so comically yet endearingly displaying a pout and tired glare. “There’s no need for that, Eichi. Believe me, I don’t stick around because of obligations — it’s because I _like_ being your friend.”

* * *

Attacks as a result of his weak constitution were nothing less than the norm for Eichi, but even so, Keito panics, he calls the hospital immediately as Eichi keels over, short of breath and uniform shirt covered in the blood he so revoltingly coughed out, trying his best to keep _some_ composure but failing to do so, for his body had won this time, and he could not fight back, he could not exercise the authority of an ‘emperor’ — he had no _power_ over his own body, no power over his own life, and the very fact prowled over him and haunted him, it made him wonder what he could be doing in these potential last moments of life.

But an ambulance came and picked him up right before he passed out, and he woke up in those familiar rooms, blindingly white walls surrounding him from all four sides in a way that he just found it so unimaginative, he found the scenery as something he greatly _disliked_.

There was one thing, however, that brings life to an otherwise lifeless interior, and it was the green-haired boy who sat in a chair next to his bed, holding white roses in a glass vase, the flowers blooming so beautifully that Eichi found it sad that their life, too, had been cut short for the sake of decoration, for the sake of ‘sympathy’.

“You’re awake.” Keito pushes up his glasses, and he puts the vase on the table that was also next to Eichi’s bed. “I’m glad you’re okay, and I’m glad you didn’t kick and whine when the people from the hospital came. It’s cooperating with them that allows you to recover your health faster — with that said, it got you here faster, and you’re healing nicely, so it’d be nice if you kept that up, Eichi.”

“It’s because I couldn’t find the strength to protest that I didn’t.” Eichi plays with the strings of his hospital gown, and he wonders when he can slip into his more comfortable silk pajamas, the ones they saved just for him. “But if you keep praising me for that, I might listen to you. Hey, how about next time, you pat my head too for listening? You don’t do it as much anymore…it’s one of your childish habits that I really miss, Keito.”

“If you’re insinuating the fact that you’d force yourself into another attack for the sake of me patting your head, you’re simply incorrigible. I’m tired of having to hear such things — you’ll live a long life in ease one day.”

Keito sighs — he’s done with the topic, and Eichi laughs, reaching out a hand to touch one of the roses. “Is this from the gardens?”

“Yes, your parents wanted me to bring it over to you — ‘a piece of home’, they said.”

“Well, it’s not like I really like that suffocating household…and the hospital is my second home, anyway, so thoughtlessly bringing me roses just to make it seem like they’re worried about me is rather abhorrent.”

“What, are you going to ask me to buy you flowers from the local flower shop instead?”

“I never asked you to bring me flowers, let alone buy me some.” Eichi smiles, and Keito frowns, his amusing face making the blonde laugh with a hint of affection. “But if it’s from you, I don’t mind receiving them.”

* * *

Eichi’s eyes continue to take in the hospital’s white walls, though the white roses beside him stand out more, as well as the white lab coat of his doctor that had just walked in. He greets him with his usual smile, his mantra of “I’m fine, thank you” already prepared to roll of his tongue with practiced ease and tone. Just for dramatic effect, he lifts a hand to wave at him, ready for his doctor to…probably scold him, but tell him some other things about his conditions (and though he tells him that he feels fine, he doesn’t believe him, and makes him stay in the hospital for a couple more days).

But whereas every visit had begun with his doctor giving him a genuinely enthusiastic nod to Eichi’s direction, the atmosphere around him was rather grim, and when his doctor lifted his head up, there was no smile, no excitement — just a sorrowful grimace on his face, and Eichi’s hand drops, his smile quickly fading away.

The doctor hastily walks over to all the equipment Eichi was hooked up to, first transferring his IV bag to a rolling stand for it, fiddling with the tubes slightly and adjusting the dosage. Years of his practiced profession had led him to easily maneuver around the various machines that were all hooked up to Eichi, typing and tapping and squinting at the many screens and numbers and lines before he approaches Eichi’s bed and starts peeling off the electrodes and other tubes except for the IV, muttering words under his breath.

“I shouldn’t be doing this,” he says, low enough so that Eichi could hear what he was saying. “If the nurses found out that I’d let you walk out of here, they’d just talk my ear off, and I don’t really want that. Listen, I’ll tell it to you straight — that friend that visits you all the time, Keito? Long story short, he’s been in an accident — hey, don’t move, I just have a couple of more things to take off. Anyway, he’s in the room right across from you, and I’m letting you see him. I know you’re worried, but…he’s in critical condition right now.”

The words that Eichi found grating to the ears, the words Eichi found so insincere and vacant and void of any sympathy — like a hypocrite, he lets those words fall out. “Is he going to be okay?”

“You’ve seen death far more than I have, Tenshouin.” The doctor peels off the electrode hooked up to the equipment, and he sighs, shaking his head with an aura so _sad_ that Eichi felt it, too, a feeling unfamiliarly washing over him, and he felt his insides twist in retaliation to the oncoming despair that graced Eichi only a few times, and even then, the atmosphere wasn’t as heavy as what the one that had made its shelter in Eichi’s room at the moment. “Far more than I’ve seen in my career, quite frankly. When you walk in there, I think you’ll figure that out.”

* * *

Keito’s room was just as white as Eichi’s, but as he steps in, leaning on the stand with his IV for support and rolling it with a speed that was just enough to get him to Keito’s bed, to which he sat down on the chair nearby abruptly, for he could not find the energy to stand any longer.

The view from the chair — was this was Keito saw overtime he sat down, looking down at Eichi’s weak body? But now the roles were reversed, and no amount of bandages could patch up Keito completely, splotches of blood bleeding through the bandages and making Eichi’s stomach churn, because out of all things, Keito suffering in a _hospital_ was and instance he _never_ he wanted to see.

“Keito.”

The green-haired boy tries to lift a hand and reach over to something, and it was then that Eichi finally noticed the bouquet of flowers (albeit crushed, sunflowers and hydrangeas and lilies crushed under immense weight of some kind) that was on Keito’s lap, sitting helplessly in front of him. 

Eichi takes the wavering hand into his own, and Keito finally turns his head towards Eichi, green eyes glazed with something much, _much_ darker, life draining out of him although the doctors had so desperately tried to pour some back in. And he understood, he understood what the doctor had said — that this was very much the face of death, the very same creature that Keito worked for, and yet it was so cruelly taking away the _wrong person_. His ‘angel of death’, it seemed, was succumbing to his own profession.

This rush of emotions — was this what Keito felt every time Eichi yielded to his own disease, to the plague that forces the clock back every single time it strikes at his weak body? Did he feel regret, did he condemn himself silently for having no power to stop the tides of life and death, did this overwhelming worry course through his entire body, did he find it hard to find the right words to say, because they had both been acquaintances with death for so long, that their intimacy with the concept had never deepened past what they’ve seen yet never experienced? What was it like for Keito right now, his breathing so slow and unnoticeable one would think he was already dead? Was he in any pain, was there anyway to make sure he rests at ease, no matter how long he has left? Is there any chance that a higher being could perform some sort of miracle, that life would once again be breathed into him, that the shadow of death would be chased away by the bright lights of life, the very lights that Keito had shown him time and time again, the lights that made him believe in a future with the both of them together, the lights of life that Eichi so desperately hung onto because the childhood friend he cherished so much had told many times that he’d definitely bask in that light for a long time, no matter what?

“There was a flower shop near Yumenosaki that I went to.” Keito’s voice was raspy, grasping for every ounce of air in the atmosphere with desperation — ah, it hurt him to hear it. “I bought that bouquet, you see, and when I was crossing the street — well, a truck had run a red light, and…I just became a deer in the headlights. It’s a pretty stupid reason, isn’t it?”

He pauses, and then he beckons Eichi closer, to which he complies immediately — one of the few times he listens to his childhood friend, and one of the last times he’d be able to do so.

“I wanted to be the one that carried out your funeral — we’d been preparing for so long, you know — but it seems as if you have to carry it out yourself. I’m sorry, Eichi. Thanks for sticking with me all this time, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart…thank you everything. Thank you for being by my side. I hope you’ll forgive me for breaking my promise, but…I hope you’ll send my soul up to heaven regardless.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry about, so there’s no need to beg for forgiveness.” Eichi’s grip on Keito’s hand tightens at it grows lifeless by the second. He has to convey his feelings now more than ever, expose his pride and everything that he is to the childhood friend he’s always held close to him, the childhood friend he opened his heart to. “In any case, I would have sent you to heaven either way — did you think that promise was just for my sake? It was always for yours, too, Keito…so really, you don’t have to be sorry. Though I’m not as prepared for your funeral as you are with mine…I hope you still enjoy the view.”

Keito’s life was slipping away; he could see it through the way he’s almost stopped breathing, through the luster of his green eyes rusting away and assimilating into death’s embrace. Death was an awfully familiar sight, and it didn’t look good on Keito, but there was no stopping death’s grip on Keito, there was no turning back time to stop it. Though he finds it hard to pull through, he smiles, the words that pry through his lips leaving a rather bittersweet taste in his mouth.

“This is coming from the bottom of my heart, too — thank _you_ for everything as well, for being my friend up until now. And, like you said…I don’t stick around because of obligations. It’s because I _like_ being your friend. That’s why…you should rest at ease, Keito.”

* * *

_Keito carries the bouquet delicately, looking down at his phone, which had the messages he had with Eichi pulled up. Texting was something he scarcely carries out — in fact, he hardly glances at his phone like this at all — but there had been a new message sent by his childhood friend, and he read it while waiting for his turn to cross the sidewalk._

_> > Eichi: Are you coming, Keito?_

_> > Eichi: I’m getting restless, you know._

_He shakes his head, typing out his message as the light on the other side signals him that it was safe to walk._

_> > Keito: Don’t get too worked up._

_> > Keito: I’m on my way, so that’s why you should stay at ease, Eichi._

_He smiles as he sends them — although his childhood friend was extremely stubborn, he was glad that he was at least recovering, enough to tease him through words on a screen._

_From the distance, he heard cars honking, and when he looks up, he finds himself right in front of an oncoming truck._

* * *

When he died, he was buried the way he wanted to be — with whatever suited his family’s whims and customs, with normalities in the ceremony and a plastered mask on Eichi’s face as he gives Keito’s eulogy, one hiding his grief and regret and bitterness to the higher beings that let him outlive the childhood friend he was so, so sure that had a bright future ahead of him, a future that would shine with or without Eichi in the picture, because it was Keito, and he knew that his friend would never forget him then.

But even with the promises made in that hospital room, would Keito know that Eichi would never take his kindness for granted? Would he know that he'd hold him dear in sickness and in health? That he who lived and he who died — does he know that he'll tell his story?

Does he know that Eichi will never forget him?

There was a change made in Eichi’s funeral plans, and when he made them, he placed the papers next to Keito’s grave, smiling, promising he’ll get to see him eventually and to be patient for Eichi’s inevitable arrival. “Don't lecture me too much when I get there,” he laughs, albeit with a sad smile.

When Eichi died just a year later, his gravestone was nowhere to be found on the Tenshouins’ plot of land in the cemetery. It stood somewhere else instead, somewhere much more important to him than any other place, for it meant that it had become possible to arrive at each other’s hearts.

Keito’s grave stands silently yet powerfully among his fellow ancestors, and Eichi’s was right beside him. It seemed only proper to have their final resting places right next to each other, pulled together with woven bonds and woven memories.

Death couldn’t do them ‘part.


End file.
